West Virginians aren’t ready to reopen businesses

The governor might be ready to open the state, but are we?

We did a poll asking respondents if they thought West Virginia was ready to reopen. We acknowledge the following data isn’t a large enough sample size (523 responses) to apply to the whole state, or even the whole county, but it does give us an idea of how people are feeling:

43.4% — No, we are not ready to reopen until there is widespread testing or antibody testing across the board.
26.4% — Yes, we need to reopen everything immediately.
24.5% — Yes, we are ready to reopen but only under strict rules and in phases, like the current plan.
5.7% — No, we are not ready to reopen until there are therapy drugs and/or a vaccine available.

A quarter of respondents are ready now; a quarter want to take it slow; but nearly half don’t think West Virginia is ready to open for business yet, and it’s hard to blame them.

There are 1,792,147 people in West Virginia (says 2019 U.S. Census data) and 84,319 tests done, according to the DHHR. That should mean roughly 4.7% of the state’s population has been tested for COVID-19. But these results include repeat testing, such as the weekly testing at Sundale and other businesses. In reality, less than 4.7% of West Virginia’s population has been checked for coronavirus. Constantly retesting the same individuals drives the positive rate down, because eventually those individuals will recover and test negative or — terrible as it is to say — die. If people who have never been tested were finally checked, we’d likely see a spike in positive cases from both symptomatic and asymptomatic carriers.

Right now, the state doesn’t have the testing capacity and the data to reassure us that going back to life “as normal” is safe. But we also understand we can’t let the world grind to a complete stop, either.

So it’s OK to take it slow. Just because everything is opening up doesn’t mean you have to go out. You know yourself — your comfort, your health. Do what’s best for you and don’t feel pressured to get out right away.

For the 26% of people who want to open businesses now, the best way to encourage your more cautious neighbors to come out of the house is to follow health precautions. Wear a mask in public places and maintain social distancing. Wash your hands frequently and thoroughly, and use hand sanitizer. Don’t shame people for wearing a mask or being reluctant to make unessential shopping trips.

Yes, masks are hot, stuffy and overall uncomfortable. Yes, social distancing is annoying. But this is going to be our new normal, at least for a while, as much as we may hate it. So find a fashionable and functional mask to wear in public, stay six feet apart and just remember:

If we don’t take these precautions now, we may all be on lockdown before the end of summer. And then we’d have to start this process over.

Despite our differing opinions on everything else, hopefully we can all agree we’d rather not have to do this again.